Sunday, July 24, 2005

The Microsoft answer to the Google Maps is finally here. I won't go into the usability and features exploration here but will concentrate on the quality of maps instead.Interestingly enough, even though the map data provider for both services is the same - NAVTEQ, MSN Virtual Earth has a lower scale, showing more detail of the terrain than the Goggle Maps or the Google earth. Microsoft offers at least three times higher resolution than the Google Maps.That said, Google has a better overlay alignment of the graphic maps over the satellite image. The map and the image actually match, whereas the MSN Virtual Earth has a little problem with it. The graphics of the streets are crude and do not align with the photo imagery of those streets.